As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”

 

To be holy isn’t to put on a facade of being spiritual. In fact, that is actually a lie and the opposite of holiness. To be holy directs our focus to things that are good and pure, that are pleasing to God, that bring Him glory. To be holy is to be obedient when the flesh craves to be otherwise. It requires that we deny ourselves, that we take up our cross, and we follow Him. . . . We can only be holy if we rely completely upon the grace of God.

 

 

 

 

For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.

 

If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.

 

 

 

 

Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.

 

A voice says, “Cry out.”

    And I said, “What shall I cry?”

 

“All people are like grass,

    and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field.

 

The grass withers and the flowers fall,

    because the breath of the Lord blows on them.

    Surely the people are grass.

 

The grass withers and the flowers fall,

    but the word of our God endures forever.”